At short notice due to a speaker unable to attend, Ian Wickham was invited to speak about WORKING TOGETHER – BUILDING STRONG GRAZIER / OWNER RELATIONSHIPS and we have enclosed a copy of my Handout which summarizes 10 points to consider to achieve a good relationship.

My ‘take home message’ was that although I did not address this in detail on the day, over a period of 35 years and nearly one million young stock and dealing with thousands of industry participants at all levels, NZ Grazing has “Systemised” the development of dairy replacements for the period from weaning to shortly before herd entry.

Because it takes only one bad event to happen during this time to cause a poor result, a considerable amount of knowledge, experience and skill is needed to ensure that good results are consistently achieved.

As Founder of the NZ Grazing Company, my dream was to help farmers realise the considerable investment they make in genetic gain by having their 2 year old heifers achieve more that the 75% level of production as compared to their 5 year herd mates. Unfortunately this percentage is currently less than 75% across all breeds, and we believe this is mainly because of weekly rate casual type arrangements and lack of attention to detail by several participants.

Clients of NZ Grazing  routinely achieve between 80 to 90% and even better because the Owner is better able to focus his/her skills on more profitable herd milksolid production rather than ‘running off’ to see the heifers or leaving a lot to chance!